Christopher Kostow has earned four Chronicle stars and three Michelin stars for his creative Wine Country cooking at the Restaurant at Meadowood in St. Helena. Earlier this week I returned to check out the remodeled bar and see how his cooking has evolved in the year or so since I was last there.

Each night he produces an 11-course tasting menu ($225), always with a few extras thrown in. Spring is a great time to go because the amazing bounty of such ingredients as green almonds and lettuces, and herbs like sorrel, which show up in the menu. If you follow the pattern you never know exactly what you’re going to get until it arrives in a plate, bowl or platter.

On this visit I also noticed that Kostow was using more Asian techniques and ingredients than in years past: yogurt with a fine confetti of shisho and umeboshi plums; asparagus with raw shaved surf clams; bavette with Koji rice.

It was a seamless blending that still points to a strong sense of place. Instead of ending with the traditional mignardise, we received a crystal bowl lined with grape leaves that served as a bed for candied wild angelica.